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Sunday, September 14, 2014

Fluffy, never fail Pizza Crust + Pizza Sauce

INGREDIENTS

1. 2 1/4 cup All - Purpose Flour

2. 1 cup Warm Water

3. 3 tbsp Honey

4. 3 tbsp Olive oil

5. 2 tsp Instant yeast

6. 1 1/2 tsp salt

METHOD

1. You can either use your hands or a food processor to knead the dough. Just mix all the above ingredients together except the warm water, which you can add gradually and knead until you get a not too sticky dough. We usually use up the entire cup of water, but at times leave out a few tablespoons to get the right consistency. Knead well until all the ingredients are combined and your dough looks something like this:

2. Place the dough in a lightly oiled bowl or deep bottomed vessel, and cover the bowl with a plastic wrap or damp towel.

3. Allow the dough to sit in it for 1 hour and 45 minutes to 2 hours, and then your dough should look something like this:

* WHILE THE PIZZA DOUGH IS SET APART TO RISE, PREPARE YOUR PIZZA SAUCE (recipe below)

4. Now what is important here is NOT to knead the dough at all, just gently tip it over onto a lightly greased large baking pan or pizza stone ( or a baking pan lined with a baking / wax sheet).

5. Very gently just flatten the dough with your hand to let it form a large circle, try not to use a rolling pin as you need to maintain the air bubbles inside the dough. So gently spread out the dough in the pan. Now your base is ready, just spread a pizza sauce on top. Top it with veggies and whatever topping you would like, add a generous sprinkling of mozarella cheese and bake your pizza in a preheated oven (450 degree farenheit) for 15 minutes. Enjoy!

PIZZA SAUCE

This recipe is from an old magazine at home which mom has had with her for quite a long time, however we've tweaked it slightly as the years rolled by.

This is the untweaked version:

Now onto our tweaked version:

1 Onion finely chopped

4-5 medium sized Tomatoes (finely chopped)

1 heaped tbsp garlic finely chopped

Few basil leaves

Ajwain - 1 tsp

Pepper - 1/2 tsp

Tomato sauce(ketchup)- 3 tbsp

Olive oil

Salt to taste

METHOD

1. Beat half a cup of chopped tomatoes along with half a teaspoon of ajwain in a food mixer or processor until it turns into a smooth semi-liquid paste. Keep this aside.

2. Heat olive oil in a pan and add garlic, once the garlic starts turning golden add in the onion and stir. Once the onion starts changing colour, add in the rest of the chopped tomatoes and saute until they become soft and mushy.

3. Add basil leaves, 1/2 tsp ajwain, pepper and the tomato paste prepared on step -1. Add salt and tomato sauce/ ketchup. Remove from heat once the oil starts separating or just as you feel everything has combined well.

4. Your pizza sauce is now ready to go on top of your crust!

For any queries regarding the recipe, please use the comments box below!